Consumer awareness of the ethical, environmental and health considerations involved with factory farming production methods is growing, and consumers are increasingly wanting to make informed choices on the animal-derived food products they purchase. Despite demand and growth in awareness, animal derived food products are still labelled with a confusing and incoherent abundance of poorly defined and unregulated labelling terms. A suite of such voluntary standards and third party certification schemes of varying regulation have resulted in the big producers redefining the terms to suit themselves, and have left consumers with a spectrum of products produced under a range of conditions. This ambiguity does not facilitate the ability of consumers to make informed product purchases.

This guide has been developed to help take the confusion and guesswork out of all the terms and labels that consumers are faced with by presenting common conditions in standards for welfare focused cattle, sheep, pig, and poultry certification schemes.

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How the consumer guide was produced

This online guide has been produced with support from all standards or certification schemes.

Humane Society International (HSI) developed a survey based on common conditions presented in standards for welfare-focused cattle, sheep, pig, and poultry product certification schemes. Also taking into consideration common public concerns for animal welfare in method of production for animal products, HSI developed a set of questions relating to standards for animal welfare certification schemes.

The survey was given to all major certifiers to complete. Any information not provided was obtained from information provided on certifiers' websites. Data was then developed into a form which clearly presented responses in a way so that they could easily be compared against each other.

So how does it work?

The Debate Over Stocking Rates for Free Range Hens

There has been a lot of discussion over the past months about the egg industry's plans to increase stocking densities for free range layer hens to 20,000 birds per hectare. Australian Egg Corporation, the peak industry body for egg producers, is attempting to introduce a new industry standard, Egg Standards Australia, that they say will cap stocking rates for free range hens at 20,000 hens as many free range eggs are already being produced under much higher stocking rates. Egg Corporation also claim that their new egg standard will make more free range eggs available to a growing population at a more competitive price than those produced by farmers that have modelled their production systems on the Model Code of Practice and stock their hens at just 1,500 per hectare or less.

Coles has also increased the stocking rate for their branded free range eggs to 10,000 hens per hectare.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission stepped into this debate recognising that the consumer needed to have their say in this matter. The Egg Corporations has now withdrawn its Certification Trademark application.

You, the consumer, should have the loudest voice in this matter because you have an expection of what free range means and how you expect free range hens to be treated. However, this issue is not just about animal welfare and your percepetion of what a flock of free range hens looks like.

Egg Corporation has ignored the environmental implications in their plans to dramatically increase hen numbers outdoors. This should concern us all.

If you feel strongly about keeping stocking rates for hens at sustainable levels, you can be heard by writing to your local member and state minister for agriculture.

Humane Choice is running a postcard campaign for consumers that wish to support the 1,500 stocking density set out in the Code of Practice. You can learn more about the cards and where to get them here.

Submit your product and get involved

Producers or Certifiers

If you have an accreditation scheme which covers cattle, pigs, sheep or poultry, or if your product is accredited by a standard, and it is not available on the consumer guide please complete a survey so that the standards can be added. Alternatively, please contact us and we can send you a hard copy of the survey to complete.